Dallam: Setting the Record Straight

(APR 22, 2005) WBAN received a “Setting the Record Straight” open letter from Stephanie Dallam, the sister of Katie Dallam, who wrote a response to an April 21, 2005 news article about Sumya Anani’s appearance on Dateline this coming Sunday.

Stephanie Dallam wrote the following:

In Sumya Anani’s article she notes for many years that she was angry with Katie and her family and suggests that Katie’s severe brain injury was actually the result of a car accident, rather than the 140 blows to her head during the fight. I would like the opportunity to set the record straight. Sumya has never talked to a doctor that actually examined Katie. Nor has she any knowledge of the fender bender that happened the night before. Sumya wasn’t at the accident, never saw the car that Katie drove, and never talked to Katie after the accident. To my knowledge she hasn’t even seen the accident report. I have done all of these things. It was a low speed impact fender bender. The other car hit the passenger side where Katie’s trainer was sitting. He wasn’t wearing his seat belt and bumped his head. He was OK but was kept overnight for observation.

Katie was in a seat belt and not hurt. She never even bumped her head. It was a low speed impact and the car itself was barely hurt. Katie drove it away from the scene.

Moreover, I talked to the surgeon right after he finished repairing Katie’s brain. What he found after opening Katie’s head was not a “slow brain bleed” – it was the complete and total shredding of the main blood vessel in her brain. In fact when he removed Katie’s skull the blood hit and coated the ceiling. This was caused from repeated battering of the brain from blows hitting her from both sides of her head.

I am trained in emergency trauma care and worked for 10 years in an intensive care unit. I was with Katie for the 24 hours prior to the fight, during the fight and the eight years since the fight. If my sister had any injury before this fight, she would have had to go through me to get into the ring.

Maybe Anani should be mad at the promoter, the referee and the doctor. They had no medical equipment, didn’t stop the fight when Katie was bleeding profusely from her nose, and didn’t bother to check on her after the fight. Katie’s trainer also bears responsibility for placing her in a mismatch. We don’t blame Anani for what happened, and bear her no ill will. It would be nice if she stopped blaming Katie and would let the fight end.

Stephanie Dallam, RN, MSN